Second International Symposium on jackals and related species

HERE is the official website with Registration and Abstract submission forms.

Between 31st of October 2018 and 2nd of November we will meet again, this time in Marathon Bay, Attica province, Greece.

The Symposium is organized by Biosfaira NGO, Dept of Biology University of Athens and GOJAGE. Many thanks to Dr Anastasios Legakis who accepted to be director of the Symposium.

Registration and Abstract can be submitted online.

The aim of this meeting is to create a fertile ground for productive discussions between novice and experienced golden jackal (Canis aureus) scientists but also on other related species like African baked-black jackal (Canis mesomelas), side-striped jackal (Canis adustus) and African wolf (Canis anthus).

The Second International Jackal Symposium is addressed to academics - graduate and undergraduate researchers alike - working or interested in the field of jackal and related species ecology, to share their information with other colleagues from different research groups with known experts or scientific community.

Thursday, June 15, 2017

On 2th, 4th and 5th of June 2017, Stefano Locatelli in cooperation with environmental police of the Province of Bergamo has photo-trapped a golden jackal in the High Val Brembana, Bergamo Province, Lombardy, North western Italy: Orobie Natural Park (Parco delle Orobie Bergamasche)
This is the westernmost record for the species in Italy, and the first datum for the region Lombardy. This datum, together with a single datum for Modena province south to the Po River, indicates that the expansion of the species is finally increasing also in Italy.

Actualization: 26th of June 2017
During the night 23rd to 24th of June 2017 a Bio Acoustic Monitoring (BAM) survey was organized in val Brembana by Luca Lapini toghether with Carlo Comazzi, Stefano Locatelli and Luigi Nervi (agent of Bergamo province environmental police).
The BAM NR and the results of the previous BAM survey near village of Mirandola, Modena province will be presented in GOJAGE e-Bulletin within a report of actual species movements in northern part of Italy, Po river basin.

The video was sent first to Luca Giussani, then to Adriano Martinoli << Unità di Analisi e Gestione delle Risorse Ambientali >> who sent it to GOJAGE representative in Italy, our colleague Luca Lapini.

The video was uploaded in the mailing list of Astore a Friulian naturalistic association. It was analyzed and seems that the golden jackal is an adult male.

On Friday 9th of June 2017 a team will conduct BAM (BioAcoustic Monitoring) in the area and will analyze the ecological factors to assess better the last C1 (strong evidence) sighting.

Wednesday, April 5, 2017

Movements and home range territory studied with use of GPS collars in Serbia

Department of Animal Ecology and Geography, University of Belgrade, Serbia

On 12th of March 2017 GOJAGE Serbia announced that a pair of golden jackals (male and female) were collared at the edge of an urban area of Belgrade. Jackals were collared with GPS collars (GPS/GSM on male, GPS/radio on female) collars.University of Belgrade, Department of Animal Ecology and Geography

New data on Denmark golden jackal vagrant individuals and the possible existence of a survival cluster in NE Jutland

We present the last species record by Troels Kjær and Henrik Friis from Olympus Danmark and the updated golden jackal species Denmark situation presented by Mogens Trolle, mammalogist of Natural History Museum Denmark (here).

We added the BAM results and questions regarding jackal applied ecology in NE Jutland Denmark in a brief technical report and we published it in e-GOJAGE bulletin.

In a context like the European one, where the population of golden jackal (Canis aureus) is increasing, my work is intended to provide starting points for the development of new non-invasive monitoring methods to combine with existing ones, for the census of natural populations. The data for the study were collected in Ultima Frontiera Reserve in Romania.

confirm the presence of golden jackals, through induced howling technique;

evaluate the potential for estimating the number of individuals, by counting from sonogram;

evaluate the potential for recognition of species, through semi-automatic techniques for the bio-acoustic analysis;

analyze the behavior of the golden jackal in Romania, in an artificial feeding context.

Credit: Carlo Comazzi

Data on the presence of jackals were obtained through jackal howling technique; in particular we have seen how individual animals have responded more than groups. These findings have led to the supposition that animals who responded, were animals satellites belonging to a large pack; additional data to test this hypothesis are still needed. Counting the certain minimum number of individuals from the sonogram, was performed on recordings collected in the Reserve, and the resulting estimate was compared with the number of individuals estimated by the operator in the field. It was found that when the number of vocalizing animals was higher than two, counting from sonogram underestimated the number of individuals compared to the estimate in the field. This discrepancy is due to characteristics of howling and to the distance of the animal. For the bio acoustic analysis we have used the first and second howl of several species of jackals and Canis lupus. In particular, two data sets have been processed in order to obtain the dissimilarity index between the different howls through dynamic time warping, one containing the files with the original duration and the other containing the files with standardized duration. On the matrix of the acoustic distances produced it was then applied a clustering algorithm based on the similarity between given pairs of points. The results obtained from bio acoustical analyses, highlight the importance of geographical and ecological differences of the populations and species considered, besides the importance of the duration of individual howls related to body size. In any case further analysis are necessary using a larger sample and the whole howling of considered species. The videos for behavioral analysis were collected in areas with feeding points refilled regularly. Their analysis has resulted in the frequency of behaviors and their transitions. The highest frequencies were found “for body bent down” and vigilance behaviors, and for some of the combinations that contained them. The significant sequences, contained threat behaviors. These suggest that the presence of con-specific and birds at the feeding point, can bother the jackal that feeds. Behavioral analysis showed that, in all probability the vigilance of the golden jackal in the study area is due to the presence of con-specific and birds that can steal food; based on this, it would be interesting to see if the vigilance of the animal that feeds in the presence of other animals increases and if this increase can lead to chronic stress that can affect the fitness of the jackals present in the study area.

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Ecology Department of NGO Crispus Sibiu Romania and Friulian Museum of Natural History Udine Italy took the initiative to form this informal study group and agreed to open a free website for a better collection of information and presentation of current concerns regarding the study of jackal populations in Europe (Ovidiu C Banea & Luca Lapini).

This group is open to anyone who wants to get involved in the study of jackals and relationships that it develops to biodiversity and human activities. GOJAGE has no management structures and is not subject to any kind of policies or demands by administrative or scientific organizations.

The sole purpose of creating this group is to gather information about the golden jackal in all European countries and to communicate joint research activities and specialized monitoring for the golden jackal species.